A slurry injector can be employed in a variety of applications wherein a liquid media, comprising an insoluble component, is dispersed, diffused, and/or introduced from one environment to another. One such application is in coal gasification reactors wherein a coal slurry feedstock is introduced into a gasification reactor via a slurry injector. In applications such as this, slurry injectors are prone to erosion due to friction imparted by the insoluble component within the slurry on the internal surfaces of the injector. The occurrence of erosion can result in improper metering, a poor injection plume, and so forth, which increase maintenance costs and lowers operating efficiencies or availability.
To reduce the rate of erosion, the injectors can be formed of erosion-resistant alloys such as cobalt-chromium superalloys, nickel-chromium superalloys, and the like. These erosion-resistant alloys decrease the rate of erosion compared to softer metallic alloys, such as stainless steel; however, they are still prone to erosion. As a result, what is needed in the art is slurry injectors having improved erosion resistance to reduce maintenance costs and increase operating efficiency.